Round Two: Avenue 5

Avenue 5: Season 1, Episode 2 “And Then He’s Gonna Shoot Off…” (B)

This second installment was definitely entertaining, if a tiny bit unsophisticated. I like the premise of this show and I think it can run successfully for a while, but it’s going to take some getting used to regarding some of its more outrageous elements. What’s clearest is that no one aboard the ship in a leadership role of any sort has a clue what they’re doing, and they’re actively making decisions which are worsening the situation. Neil Casey is everywhere on HBO after appearing on “Silicon Valley” and “Mrs. Fletcher,” and his engineer Cyrus has an awfully positive idea about how long the delay would be, which Ryan of course opted to share with the chattiest and most troublesome passenger, thereby ensuring that it would be passed along to everyone else in no time. The lengthy delay between transmissions is irritating, and that time allows Judd to come up with even more terrible ideas than he already had. Having funerals aboard the ship was problematic enough, and now having dead bodies stuck in space orbiting the ship for their entire journey home is a true nightmare. I saw Zach Woods in a more normative role in the upcoming film “Downhill” at Sundance this week, and he really is such a natural here at playing a certain part, which in this case finds him haplessly trying to provide customer satisfaction while failing miserably, just like everyone and everything else on this doomed space cruise. Let’s see what’s in store for episode three.